


Running Down a Dream

by tryslora



Category: Teen Wolf (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Future, Alternate Universe - Law Enforcement, Amnesia, Community: tw_fallharvest, Full Shift Werewolves, Future Fic, Implied Mpreg, Kid Fic, M/M, Magical Stiles Stilinski, Minor Allison Argent/Lydia Martin, Minor Isaac Lahey/Scott McCall, Minor Malia Tate/Kira Yukimura
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-09
Updated: 2014-11-09
Packaged: 2018-02-21 10:14:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,107
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2464556
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tryslora/pseuds/tryslora
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He wakes into an unknown room and without his memories. The name they give him tastes unfamiliar on his tongue, and he wonders if he'll ever find the memory-eating aliens that did this to him, or the magical spell to give him back his life.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Running Down a Dream

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ataratah](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ataratah/gifts).



> Oh my dear, I wanted so much to give you everything you wanted, but I couldn't get them to all fit in neatly into one fic. I was thrilled that you requested amnesia--it may well be my favorite trope, and if not, it's definitely in my top ten. I had considered a whole cop adventure plotline, but it was slipping far too far into angst along the way to the happy ending, so I shelved it for another time. I hope you enjoy this wee story; I had an absolute blast writing it for you! Also, thank you SO MUCH for the reference art; I hope you can see the ways in which it influenced the story that I told.

“I don’t get it.” He looks out the window where the nurse points, to where there’s a family—a _large_ family—on the lawn below. They are scattered in the sun in pairs of adults and occasional children, except for one darkly-scruffed man who lies on his back and seems to be a human jungle gym. No less than seven children are either playing on him or sitting near enough to him that they could be (one is reading, her hand out to touch his ankle as if it anchors her, and a tiny red-headed girl sleeps by his elbow).

When a small boy—his freckles visible even from a distance—grips the man’s arm and bites down, the man howls dramatically, and the children all laugh and praise the smaller one.

It’s a strange sight, and if he were in the mood for people maybe he’d watch longer. As it is, he lets the curtain fall. “Is this supposed to mean something to me?”

The nurse sighs and tucks a curly lock of greying brown hair behind one ear. “I’d think it would, but apparently not.”

He cocks his head. “Do I know them?”

She gives him a level look, meeting his gaze. “I don’t know. Do you?”

He wonders if he should, if that’s the reaction she’s expecting. But when he reaches into his heart, tries to find names and emotions, he comes up empty-handed. In the end, he shakes his head and shrugs, open-handed. “I don’t, I’m sorry.”

Her shoulders slump and she seems to curl in on herself for a moment. “Well then, we tried.”

“Wait.” He reaches out for her before she goes, catches her wrist before letting her go quickly. It seems wrong to hold her; he should never grab a woman that way. “Are you ever going to tell me my name? Did I have any identification on me? What actually _happened_ to me?”

She presses her lips together, and he gets the feeling that she _wants_ to tell him, but in the end, she just shakes her head. “I’m sorry, I promised the doctor that I wouldn’t say anything. He thinks it’s better if you remember on your own.”

When she leaves, he goes back to the window and lifts the curtain, peering out. There are two men with the children now—the original one broader of build, the dark scruff on his face making him seem older and more serious, and the second one with tanned skin and a ready smile set into a lopsided face. He waits for some kind of recognition to set in, but nothing comes. When they look up, he quickly lets the curtain fall and walks away.

#

He wakes into the early morning with strange dreams lingering at the edges of his mind. He grabs the pad of paper that the nurse left for him (what is her _name_?) and quickly scribbles the patterns that seem emblazoned on his mind. A circle around another circle. A set of three almost spirals, linked. A fleur de lis.

And of _course_ he knows it’s a fleur de lis, not just some weird scrawled image. He knows what _that_ is called when he doesn’t even know his own name, but he doesn’t know what any of them _mean_.

There’s a soft tap on the door before it opens, and he looks up, frowning slightly at the man who walks in. “Who are you?”

“I’m Dr. Deaton,” the man introduces himself.

The man’s voice is soothing; he doesn’t trust it at all. But he sits up on the bed, makes sure his hospital gown is tugged closed behind him. “Great, good, I’m finally seeing a doctor. Any chance you want to show me my chart and tell me my name? Or am I just a John Doe here?”

Dr. Deaton’s smile is gentle. “I’ve brought your wallet,” he says, placing the brown leather on the table between them. Another piece of folded leather—black this time—sits beside it. “And your badge. After careful consideration, we’ve determined that withholding certain information from you does not seem to be sparking your memory, therefore we will give you this and then let you rest in hopes that it will return on its own.”

“And if it doesn’t?”

Dr. Deaton’s expression is serious. “If it doesn’t, then it may be that you must begin again, which is an unfortunate occurrence. I can assure you that your family and friends are quite concerned and anxious to see you, but I believe that at this time, that could be more detrimental than good. You are stubborn, and you are easily frustrated. If you do not immediately recognize them, and if you are exposed to their frustration, it may push your memories further inside your mind.”

“Right.” None of it makes any sense to him, but he’s not a doctor. In fact, it looks like he’s a cop. When he flips open the black billfold, it’s a badge on one side and a picture ID on the other. He frowns at the page. “My name is _what_?”

“Everyone calls you Stiles.” Dr. Deaton stands in a smooth motion. “If you need anything, either Melissa or Isaac will be here for you; they are working opposite shifts in order to ensure that one is always here. Take your time and go through your things; we’ll speak again tomorrow.”

Stiles.

He opens his mouth, exhales the name on a breath and tries to taste it for familiarity.

 _Stiles_.

Nope, not a thing.

Well, at least he has a name, and it’s more pronounceable that the thing he sees written on his police identification, and on his wallet as well. 

Phone. Wait… shouldn’t he have a phone? Doesn’t everyone have a phone these days? Why can he remember the concept of phones, but can’t remember anything about his life?

No, wait, he has a phone. It’s the latest model iOS and he even remembers the game he was playing over breakfast while… while… 

Crap. Nothing else.

It’s a start.

He sets the badge aside (notes his identification number, the issue date, the fact that he’s pretty sure he’s been a cop for three years, four months, and seventeen days because he somehow knows the current date). The wallet is thin, one of those slimline models designed to hold sixteen credit cards without making a lump in your back pocket. His has two crisp twenty dollar bills, a bank card, two credit cards issued to the same _unpronounceable name_ Stilinski, his driver’s license (he’s twenty-five, and his birthday’s coming up in two weeks), and a photo.

He slips the picture free from the plastic casing where it’s kept better protected than his license. It’s well-worn, like he’s rubbed his thumb over it before exactly the same way he finds himself doing now, as if he can somehow reach out and touch the people on the other side.

He recognizes his own face— _Stiles Stilinski_ he says to himself, trying to remind himself of that. He has his arm around a woman with soft cheeks and wavy brownish blond hair. She has one hand on her stomach and her gaze is cast to one side, glaring at his own image. She looks like she’s about to pop any day, so Stiles can’t exactly blame her if she’s glaring at him for making her that pregnant. It has to be uncomfortable. And there are several kids around them: a taller dark-skinned girl with a fall of dark, curly hair who looks young but stands as tall as the woman’s shoulder already, two smaller boys—one looks remarkably like Stiles himself, and the other has bright hazel eyes. There’s an Asian girl with a serious look, and a little redheaded toddler who clings to Stiles’s leg with fierce strength. He can just barely see a cherubic boy with blond curls peering out from behind the woman.

How many children do they _have_? And are some of them adopted? This has to be his wife, right? Why else would she be in his pocket, and the image so well-loved?

He flips it over and reads the back; the picture is newer than he thought, taken just a few months ago. The first line reads “Malia (of course)” and the rest is a list of names. He has no idea which name belongs to which child, which is an awful feeling. He feels like he’s lost himself, but they’ve lost a parent and she—Malia—has lost a husband. It can’t be easy.

He tucks the photo back into the little pocket and tosses both the wallet and the badge on the table. He punches the button for the nurse and doesn’t even look up when the door opens.

“I want to see my partner,” he barks out. “And I want someone to tell me what happened to me.”

The voice that answers is male—Isaac, from what Dr. Deaton said—but by the time Stiles looks up, the nurse is gone and the door is closed, and he’s left swimming in a sea of no answers.

#

No one comes until morning, when Melissa knocks and pushes the door open gently. “Stiles?”

“You’re allowed to use my name now?” he counters.

“Do you recognize it?” she asks him, and he still has to shake his head.

“Not a bit, but it’s better to say than that thing that’s my legal name.” He shrugs one shoulder. “It’s a label, that’s all, and it’s more convenient than _hey you_. Are you here to tell me what happened to me? Have they caught the memory-eating aliens that abducted me?”

Her mouth twitches into a smile. “You’re starting to sound more like you,” she says quietly. “And no, but I’ve brought someone to see you.”

“Another doctor?” Because honestly, unless there’s some magic spell that will put him back to rights and make him stop feel like he’s drifting in uncertainty, Stiles isn’t interested.

“Your partner.” Melissa steps back out, and someone else comes in. At least Stiles is dressed in actual clothes this time, rather than another open-backed hospital gown.

He remembers the man who walks in. Not from his past, but from the other day, part of the crowd that Melissa had showed him through the window. “You’re the human jungle gym.”

“Not the reaction I was hoping for,” the man says dryly. “I’m Derek.”

“And you’re my partner.”

Green eyes go hooded and dark, heavy eyebrows conveying a scowl even though Derek’s expression is flat. “In a manner of speaking,” he says. “Scott wanted to come, but Lydia, Allison, and Kira are traveling, so he has all the kids.”

Derek says it like Stiles should get it, like this should make some kind of sense. He just shakes his head, tasting the names on his lips without making a sound, wondering which of the small children outside were the ones this _Scott_ had right now, and which were the ones that belonged to him and Malia. “Sorry, dude, I don’t know who you’re talking about,” Stiles admits quietly. “But hey, come on in and talk to me. Maybe it’ll jog something loose.”

If anything, Derek’s expression closes off even more. He turns away from Stiles, grabs one of the hard plastic chairsand sits down on the edge. When he gestures, Stiles perches on the edge of the bed, facing him, hands tapping a light rhythm on his knees.

“So,” Stiles says, trying to find words. How do you have a conversation with someone you probably know but think of as a complete stranger? Weather’s out—Stiles hasn’t been outside since he woke up a few days ago. He licks his lips, asks the question that occurred to him when he was going through his wallet. “Why didn’t Malia come to see me?”

Derek blinks. “Malia? She’s working. With you and Allison both out, she’s overwhelmed.”

“I work with Malia?” That doesn’t fit the picture in his wallet, and it doesn’t fit in his mind. But then, nothing fits in his mind. Stiles shakes his head. “I married another cop?”

“You married… what?” Derek is up out of the chair, standing behind it before Stiles even sees him move.

“Shit, that was like supernatural speed. Am I involved with a coven of vampires?” He’s only joking. Mostly. Stiles isn’t sure what to think about the way Derek’s gaze narrows at his words, so he bulls on, trying to explain. “Malia’s my wife. Right?”

And that’s it, any hint of openness in Derek’s expression is completely gone, shuttered away. “Sure.” The word is flat, nothing Stiles can read in his voice. “And yes, you work with Malia, and with Allison. You’ve been working there for a little over three years, fresh out of the academy. In your words, it makes better money than a professor of esoteric history ever would.”

Stiles opens his mouth, closes it again with a swift smile. “That actually feels like something I would say. Dude. You are the absolute first person to give me words that taste right.”

“You’re tasting words.”

Stiles rolls his eyes at the flat, dry tone. “How else am I supposed to know if they fit in my mouth?”

For a moment there’s a flicker of something in Derek’s expression, as if he’s about to say something and thinks better of it, retreating behind his walls again. Stiles can see him leaving as clearly as if he’s already walked out the door, and he’s not ready to let go.

“Dude, tell me something else. Who were all those people out there the other day?” He gestures at the window. “Why is Scott the one with all the kids? Who is Scott? What are the names of my kids?”

Derek glances down, his hands curled tight around the top of the chair. There’s a crack, and Stiles frowns, trying to see what happened as Derek flexes his fingers and lets go. He smoothes down the front of his shirt and carefully walks back around the chair, dropping into it, long legs stretching out. “I can do this,” Derek says, and it sounds to Stiles like he’s convincing himself.

Stiles just watches him, waits as he seems to pick and choose his words carefully, each one weighed and measured before it leaves his mouth.

“You have three children—one adopted, and two that are yours—and another one on the way,” Derek says quietly. Stiles can’t even process that. He’s not even _twenty-six_ and he has almost _four children_?

“I don’t believe in birth control?” he blurts out.

Derek snorts. “It’s not that simple. Every single one of your children was actually carefully planned.” Stiles gets the sense that there’s something left out there, but Derek lets it go, looks to a point over Stiles’s shoulder rather than meeting his gaze.

“Scott’s your best friend, and he’s a veterinarian. He works for Dr. Deat—” Derek stops himself halfway through the name, but it’s enough that Stiles can follow it. 

“Dr. Deaton is a _vet_? Why the hell am I being treated by a _vet_?”

“He’s not your typical vet.” Derek raises both eyebrows, waits until Stiles settles back before continuing. “Scott’s good with children, and he’s good at teaching them things they need to know. He’s patient, they love him, and they listen.”

“One of them bit you.” Stiles has to point it out, because as far as he remembers (in what little he does remember), biting isn’t considered good etiquette for toddlers.

Derek’s lips quirk into a barely hidden smile. “I don’t care if he bites. I heal.”

Stiles remembers what they looked like, as if Derek let the child believe that it was the worst pain imaginable. He remembers watching them play, and he can’t look at Derek any more. It seems like there’s something he’s missing here, and it irritates him not to know what it is.

“I’m a cop,” he mutters. “I can look at the sole of someone’s shoe and remember what brand it is just from the print. I can spot clues and infer a hypothesis but I can’t fucking figure out my own head.”

“It’ll come,” Derek says quietly.

Stiles pins him with a glare. He folds his arms, back stiff as he stares at him. “Really? And how do you know that?”

“Because it has to.” The words are simply said, before Derek moves to the door. “Don’t worry, Stiles. It’ll work out in the end. It always does.”

He wants to throw something at the door when it closes, wants to scream and yell, because how can this stranger have faith when Stiles can still barely call himself by his own name? He gives up on restraining himself, sinks to his knees and lets out a primal yell until his throat aches from the stress of it.

He hears a faint echo in the distance, like small voices raised in howl, deeper throats underlining the higher pitched sounds. He blinks, uncertain, but before he can decide if he truly hears it or not, the sound disappears.

With a sigh, he sinks back onto the bed and flicks on the television. His mind is already numb; TV couldn’t possibly hurt it more.

#

“Shut up, Isaac.” The door pushes open and someone steps in, back turned to Stiles, body tilted into the doorway as she shoves the male nurse out. All Stiles can see is the back of a pretty outfit, killer heels, and a fall of strawberry blond hair as she talks to the nurse. “I don’t care what Deaton says, and I don’t actually care what Scott says, either. I was on the phone for _three hours_ last night. _Three hours_ of listening to absolute misery, and I am here to do what must be done since it doesn’t seem like anyone else has the balls to do it.”

She holds up one hand, and Isaac’s mouth snaps shut before he can say anything. “Good,” she says. “Now go. If you want to tell everyone to clear out, feel free to do so, because in five minutes, Stiles is re-entering the world of the living. You’ve had him stuck in limbo long enough.”

She slams the door shut in Isaac’s face then turns, hands by her side, head tilted as she regards him. “You don’t look awful,” she says.

“And you’re gorgeous,” he returns. “Which, by the way, is a far better compliment than _you don’t look awful_ , in case you were wondering.”

She smiles thinly. “I wasn’t trying to compliment you, Stiles, it was the honest truth. After speaking to Derek last night, I somehow expected worse. He seems to have translated your missing mind into terrible health as well, but physically you seem fit. Aren’t you tired of being stuck in this room? I can’t remember the last time you’ve been so patient about being penned up.”

“Penned up?” His gaze narrows, looking past her at the door. It’s been four days now since he first woke into this room, and in those four days he’s seen the two nurses, Dr. Deaton, Derek, and now this woman. And never once in that time has it occurred to him to try to leave this room.

She raises her eyebrows, tilts her head, and that’s when he gets it.

“I’m not in a hospital.”

She nods approvingly. “Very good.”

“In fact, I’m at home,” he continues. “And everyone’s dancing around me because they think that if I get dumped back into the middle of my life, I’m not going to get better. And frankly, I can’t entirely disagree with the thought. It sounds overwhelming to walk back out into a place where everyone knows me and I know no-one.”

“Lydia.” She touches her hand to her heart, and he assumes that’s her name. “And I am not going to sugar-coat this, Stiles. The pack is going mad without you. The children are out of control, Derek’s not sleeping, and Malia is overworked. I just flew home on the first flight I could get after spending three hours in the middle of the night on the phone with your spouse and I had to leave Allison and Kira alone in the middle of some very delicate negotiations. This is not ideal. They may both be able to seem sweet, but Kira can trip over motes of dust and speaks without thinking, and Allison’s temper is absolutely brutal. Which you would know, if you could remember.” She sighs. “However, you, and the health of the pack as a whole, are both more important than that particular alliance. If I must fish it out of the toilet later, I can.”

Stiles is pretty sure none of that made sense, although the image she paints of Kira and Allison is so bright and vivid that her words spark images in his mind that might be those women. He closes his eyes, tries to cling to the idea of them until he hears a bright laugh and an _oops_ and… that’s it. It’s gone.

“Allison’s your wife.” He doesn’t know where it comes from, but it’s right there on the tip of his tongue and from the way her eyes widen, it surprises her.

“You remembered.”

He licks his lips, shakes his head. “Not exactly. I don’t consciously remember much, but I just knew it. That’s what things seem to be like for me.”

She huffs a small sigh. “Well then, I think my plan is _definitely_ better than Deaton’s. After all, immersion therapy is a known method for dealing with amnesia, and since isolating you hasn’t done any good, immersion can’t hurt more.”

Stiles hopes that Lydia is right; he’s not sure that he trusts the concept.

On the other hand, now that it has occurred to him that he’s already in a familiar space but hasn’t recognized it for the last several days, he wants to get through that door and start exploring. He steps into her space, then around her, yanking the door open so he can push into the hallway and just stand there, breathing in air that somehow tastes different, and listening to the world around him.

It is louder out here, as if the room he was in has some kind of sound baffling on it. He hears shouts in the distance, childish voices raised and a lower voice speaking to them. He turns on his heel, starts heading in that direction before Isaac appears in his way and Lydia catches at his elbow.

“Maybe you should stick your toe in the shallow end,” Lydia says quietly. “Rather than drowning in the deep.”

 _Drowning_ strikes a chord with him, and he takes an involuntary step backwards, bumping into her. She grabs his arms, squeezes gently, and he settles. “I drowned, once,” he says.

“Twice,” Lydia corrects him. “But I’m not surprised you can’t remember the second time.”

“Why?”

She touches his shoulder, waits until he turns to look at her. He has to look down, and he thinks that if she weren’t wearing heels, she might barely top five feet tall. Her gaze meets his, soft and serious. “Because the second time is what did this to you,” she tells him. “You thought you could go under without your anchor and you were wrong.”

He sifts through the scattered, meaningless fragments in his mind, trying to make sense of her words and strange images that keep sliding into his conscious thought. “You were there.”

“The first time.” She slides her hand down his arm, tangles their fingers together. “Come this way.” She looks back over her shoulder as she leads him down the hall. “Isaac, you might want to let Derek and Scott know that we’re on the move. It’s almost lunch time.”

Stiles has no idea what lunch has to do with anything, other than the way his stomach growls when she mentions it. She laughs at him, and he moves up next to her, knocking his shoulder into her lightly as if they are that familiar, and perhaps they are because she nudges him back.

It feels comfortable in a way that he hasn’t in days, so he accepts it for what it is.

She pushes open a door all the way at the end of the hall, one that opens into a room that clearly has taken over much of the floor. “Your suite,” she says.

He can’t say why the first thing he does is go straight to the bed and lift a pillow, wrapping his arms around it and burying his nose, inhaling deeply. He closes his eyes, takes in the scent of pine and dirt and a hint of musky sweat. It coils inside of him warmly, leaves him feeling vaguely comforted and aroused and for the first time as if he might be able to sleep through the night. He doesn’t remember it, but it tastes right when he whispers it on the tip of his tongue, just as the name Malia tastes wrong.

He makes a sound of irritation. “Malia is not my wife.”

The soft snort seems entirely out of sorts for the image Lydia presents. “No, Malia is not your wife, and Kira would be horrified to hear you say that,” she says. “But you are married.”

It doesn’t take much to get from _partner of sorts_ to _husband_ and he closes his eyes again, takes another breath. “So, this is the bed that Derek and I share.”

“I can’t tell if you’re remembering things or deducing them,” Lydia says. She perches on the edge of the bed, bouncing slightly against the softness. “That’s what made the Nogitsune so disturbing. You are able to think so quickly, come to such easy conclusions. You could pretend to know us, and we might never know the difference.”

“Derek would.” Stiles makes a rueful expression, shakes his head. “Memory. Sort of. I just… I know he would. He’d know me anywhere.”

“And he’s distraught that you don’t know him.”

Stiles sinks onto the bed next to her. She’s here, she’s with him, and she touches him like she knows him well. He lets all the frustration out in a long breath. “Fuck, Lydia, how the _hell_ did I end up married to someone like _him_?”

“I hope that’s a good thing.”

“Oh, it’s a compliment. Did you see him? I’m married to a model and I can’t even remember him. What the hell does that say about me?”

She touches his temple, rubs it lightly. “It says that you fucked up, and I think you were trying to do something nice at the time. The problem is, you’re an idiot, and knowing you, you had some brilliant idea for a surprise so you did it alone, and you shouldn’t have. And now we have this. But your pack loves you, Stiles, and we will all be here for you.”

“You keep saying pack.” He seizes on the word because she says it like it means something, and he doesn’t understand _what_.

“I do.” Lydia pats his hand, then stands. “You’ve got the run of the house, and they know you’ll be exploring. You should take some time, settle in. Maybe we’ll get lucky and this will all be over by dinner time, and maybe we won’t. I’m going to hope for something to go right, for once.”

He stays on the bed when she leaves, unwilling to walk away from the first place he’s felt comfortable. Instead, he kicks off his shoes and pushes down his jeans. Clad just in a t-shirt and boxers, he curls up on the comforter and wraps himself around a pillow. He closes his eyes and breathes in the scent of something vaguely familiar, and tries to rest.

#

When Stiles wakes, the sun has shifted in the sky and is low to the horizon. His stomach growls, aching and empty, and he realizes that he slept through lunch and almost all the way to dinner time. He’s warm and comfortable, and the idea of leaving this bed fills him with regret. He could burrow down here and just _stay_ , but he’s also hungry.

It’s time to venture out.

He digs through the closet and drawers, looking for things that feel right to him. He yanks on clean jeans and a t-shirt so soft and thin that he thinks it might be a decade old. There’s a hoodie thrown over the back of a chair, and he picks that up as well, shrugging into it and catching the scent of wood smoke and pine. It feels good against his skin, so he zips it halfway and shoves his hands into the pockets, heading out.

He lets his feet carry him through the house, trying not to think about where he’s going as he heads down the hallway and finds the stairs, then goes down to the lower floor of the house. Things echo in strange ways, and when he closes his eyes it is as if he can feel the boundaries of the house and the land around it stretching off into the distance. The place is big. He hasn’t left that one room in days and yet he knows that as if he had walked every inch of it this morning.

He stands there, one hand on the railing, eyes closed, sinking into the sensation of everything around him. It feels odd, like there are barriers that he can touch with his mind, and he nudges against them, feeling them push back into him. They are familiar and strong, and he is glad that they are there. Instinctively he nudges at them again, feeding them something of _himself_ and they pulse happily in return.

His eyes blink open in surprise. What _was_ that?

“Daddy!”

He doesn’t get any warning before there’s a small boy wrapped around his leg, sitting on his foot and staring up at him. He sees familiar freckles and amber-colored eyes—the same ones he saw in the mirror after waking up. The boy grins, and Stiles tries to take stock of his age. Two? Maybe two. This is the toddler he saw biting Derek outside.

He has no idea what his name is, or the name of the other children coming up behind him. Another boy, this one a little older, his hazel eyes serious and brows drawn together in a frown. The girl is even older, maybe six or seven, her skin smooth and brown, her hair a wild tangle of curls. She raises her eyebrows, and for a moment Stiles is reminded starkly of Derek—or of the hazel-eyed boy right in front of him. She crosses her arms. “I told you I heard him come downstairs.”

“Good hearing, Angie.” The voice is more familiar than the face of the man who walks in. Stiles recognizes the hint of a laugh, the patience, the optimism. It tastes like sunshine and positivity and is the opposite of himself. He knows that this is his balance, his other half in all platonic ways. 

Which means this must be his best friend, and while Stiles can’t remember his life, he can remember the details he’s heard since waking up. “Scott,” he says quietly.

The other man’s eyes light up and his smile is bright enough to melt the sun. “You remembered?”

Stiles shakes his head. “I just… I know things sometimes. You feel like my best friend, and Derek said my best friend is Scott, so therefore, that has to be you.”

Scott makes a sound halfway between a laugh and snort. “Well, I should be glad I’m not a pinpoint on a board somewhere, tracked by a red thread.” His smile shifts to rueful. “They must be all red, right about now, dude. I’m sorry.”

“I don’t even know what you’re talking about, but it feels like something I’d do.” Stiles drops one hand to touch the head of the child clinging to his leg. “And this is… this is…”

“Daddy?”

“My son,” Stiles whispers. He drops to his knees, holds his arms out and the smallest boy burrows in close, rubbing his cheek against Stiles’s like a cat. The other boy comes more slowly, but soon Stiles is holding both of them, while the girl stands nearby, smirking. 

Try as he might, Stiles can’t remember anything else.

“He smells nervous.” The girl—Angie—tilts her head. “And upset. And his stomach’s growling constantly—I could hear it before he got downstairs. We should feed him. He never can think straight when he’s hungry.”

“Dinner’s not until Papa gets home,” the older boy says. “Dinner is always when Papa gets home.”

“Daddy.” 

The small boy clings, whining softly. Stiles carries him with him as he stands, one hand still touching the head of the older boy. He wants to say something to reassure him, but he doesn’t have any words, even as small hands pat at his face, his neck, touch his throat lightly.

“Jacob.” Scott nods at the boy in Stiles’s arms, then looks down at the older one. “And Nathan. And this is Angelina.”

The names all strike chords with Stiles, and he tilts his head. “Did I name Angie for Harry Potter?”

Scott beams. “You did. If she’d been a boy, you were going to name her Fred.”

“How did Derek feel about that?” He’s still trying to figure this out. He must have been nineteen or twenty when Angie was born. That’s so _young_ and where did she come from?

“Derek wasn’t sure, but Braeden was the deciding vote.”

“Who’s Braeden?”

“My biological mom,” Angie says. “Scott, want me to take the boys to the kitchen for dinner?”

“Your dad and I will be there soon,” Scott says with a nod. Angie holds out her hands and Stiles sets his son— _his son_ —down and the boys each take one of her hands. She looks at Scott and Stiles swears he sees Scott’s eyes flash red, just for a moment, and Angie’s eyes flash yellow in return. There’s a soft growl, and when he looks again, Nathan is making a sour face, his nose wrinkles up, eyes tightly closed, and when they open, they flash brightly for just a moment.

Stiles has to be imagining things.

Scott pats Nathan on the head, smiles approvingly. “Good job,” he says, and Nathan’s entire expression changes when he beams like Scott sold him the sun.

“What was that?” Stiles asks quietly, once the children are gone.

“Something you need to remember,” Scott tells him. “Or maybe something you need to ask Derek about. Definitely not something you can avoid while living here.”

Stiles catalogs that along with every other small thing that he’s heard and seen since realizing this is home, and even some things from before that. His lips press together because he’s getting an idea of things, and none of it makes sense. Not in the real world, anyway.

“Do I have a game system?” Stiles changes the subject abruptly because he isn’t sure where it’s going, and he’s not sure he wants to get to that end anyway, considering the hypotheses he’s come up with so far. “Because I’m hungry, and I’m bored, and I just want to do something that feels vaguely familiar.”

“And _Call of Duty_ feels familiar?” Scott’s grin is playful. “Getting your ass kicked feels familiar?”

“I’m better at it than you are,” Stiles retorts.

“How do you know?”

Stiles doesn’t. He has absolutely no idea, but the give and take of trash talk feels right, and he feels as comfortable with this as he did in that bed upstairs. “Only one way to find out.”

Scott points down the hall. “Go in there. I’ll grab some food and meet you there, and ask Angie to help the boys get ready for bed. Derek should be home soon, and I’ll head out when he’s here.”

“How many people live here?”

Scott gives him a look like he’s just asked the right question, and Stiles files that away in the place where he’s keeping random data points that add up to weird things.

“You, Derek, and your kids,” he answers, but it sounds like he’s keeping something back. He opens his mouth, closes it, expression uncertain before he speaks again. “Me and Isaac live next door. Allison and Lydia, Kira and Malia, Braeden’s house is near but she’s never around.”

“We all live in one neighborhood.” Not that Stiles has been outside to see if there’s a nice tree-lined street and some white picket fences.

“Yeah.” Scott nods quickly. “We do. It’s easier this way. We built it like this.”

 _We built it like this_.

So they didn’t just move into a space that was already there, they created their own space. Like a commune.

Or a pack.

He huffs a sigh and waves for Scott to go get food. He finds the living room and the game, and curls up in one corner while everything boots up, in a spot on the couch that feels like it’s made for him. By the time they’ve started shooting zombies, he can let the rest of the world go.

#

Derek doesn’t make it home for dinner, or in time to put the kids to bed. They aren’t silent about their irritation and disappointment, although Angie points out that this just means they get to have Stiles all to themselves and he _has_ to read to them and can’t get out of it like he usually does.

 _It’s just because he likes hearing Derek’s voice when he reads_.

The words slip out before he thinks about them, and Angie beams when he says it; he gets the feeling it’s a familiar refrain. She pats his hand, and all three children lean in close and rub their cheeks against his, whining softly before he gets them to settle down for sleep.

He makes his way back up to the bedroom and stops when he sees Derek there, his shirt off as he stands in the middle of the bedroom.

Derek blinks. “I’m just… getting my things. I’ll sleep in the guest room.”

Stiles hears the silent _now that you’re not there_ tacked on to the end of that sentence. He shakes his head. “No. No you won’t. I mean, not unless _you’re_ uncomfortable, since I obviously have terrible powers of deduction and assumed I was married to someone else entirely.” He spreads his hands. “My bedroom is your bedroom, and Lydia seems convinced that immersion therapy is the best way to get my head wrapped around the things its busy hiding from me. Like what I was doing—exactly—when this happened, and the rest of my _life_. So if I’m immersing, you should probably be in my bed.”

Derek blinks again, and Stiles realizes what that sounded like.

“Fuck. I mean. _Not_ fucking. Just sleeping. In the ways that married people do when it’s the end of a long day, and the kids have been exhausting, and after whatever you do for work. Obviously I’m not doing anything right now, since I’m minus some memories and I’d probably be a crap cop when I can’t even remember my boss’s name.”

“It’s your dad,” Derek says quietly, taking a step to close the distance between them. He touches Stiles’s lips with one finger. “Shut up. It’s okay. I know what you’re trying to say.”

“Do you?” Stiles can’t seem to help himself, the words spilling out. “Because when I came up here earlier, I wrapped myself around one of those pillows because it _smelled_ right. And I slept. I mean, I really _slept_ for the first time in what feels like ages, and I didn’t have any dreams or weird nightmares or anything.”

Derek’s hand goes flat against his cheek, the pads of his fingers slightly rough against Stiles’s skin. He spreads his fingers, cupping Stiles’s face. “I’ll sleep better with you in my bed,” he admits slowly. “Your scent has been fading.”

“You don’t think it’s weird that I smelled your pillow?” It’s just another data point, but Stiles wants to know.

“You don’t smell it the same way I do, but no, it’s not weird. You’ve run with wolves long enough and you’re long past being simply human.” Derek strokes his thumb along Stiles’s cheekbone. “I just want you back.”

“I’m right here,” Stiles says, because this is the most _here_ he’s felt in days. He’s rooted. Stuck. Anchored. This is where he belongs and he doesn’t want to move any further from Derek right now than he has to. He’s running purely on instinct, and everything inside him screams to kiss this man, fall into his arms and drag him down into bed.

He also knows that wouldn’t be fair.

He sighs, the sound heavy in his lungs. “I’m just missing a few parts.”

Derek moves his hand in quick motion, lightly cuffing the nape of his neck. “Get some sleep. Maybe you’ll wake up a new man.” His mouth quirks up on one side, one eyebrow rising to match. “Or the one you used to be.”

Stiles strips down to his boxers, waves a hand for Derek to do the same, then holds up the blankets so they can both crawl under. He isn’t sure how he likes to sleep, so he lets instinct take over and soon he is lying with his back to Derek, arms wrapped around his pillow. He feels Derek slide into place behind him, one arm heavy across his chest. Stiles grabs it, pulls it in close, inhaling that same scent that felt like home before. Eyes closed with warmth behind him, he falls into his dreams.

#

He walks through the woods, the scent of a fire in the distance, pine all around him. There are other things moving through the trees, footsteps padding among the leaves with crackling sounds. He hears the low whuffs and whines, the way they speak to each other. No one is hiding; this isn’t about stealth, it’s about pack.

They all emerge into the clearing where Lydia, Allison, and Kira wait. There are no children, not tonight; this is only for the adults to run. Stiles walks in just before a yellow coyote and a big black wolf. A second smaller black wolf walks with a larger pale grey one. Then more wolves, all familiar to Stiles, but none as familiar as that first big black wolf.

He holds out his hand, and the wolf comes to him, eyes lighting red before it licks his hand. He lets his fingers tangle in its ruff, and they stand there together, the wolf leaning into his hip, as the pack finds its way into a pile of fur and humans around the fire.

Stiles sinks to his knees, buries his face in the wolf’s fur, and whispers _Derek_.

#

He flails back into consciousness, darkness still surrounding him. The alarm clock shows just past two, but Stiles’s heart is racing, his mind running faster than the wolves in his dream. He rolls over, pushes at Derek’s chest. “We need to go get something,” he whispers. “I need to show you something.”

“Shutupstiles.” It merges into one word, a long low groan of exhaustion. When Stiles nudges again, Derek looks at him, gaze sharp in the moonlight. “What is it?”

“I sense a Lassie joke on the horizon, and I am guessing that I am normally the one cracking that joke, not on the receiving end of it,” Stiles says. “Timmy has not fallen down the well, and I am not the one with the supernatural sniffer. Right?” He waits for the one slow nod from Derek. “Good, good, I’m not remembering everything, but I am having weird as fuck dreams and usually—in my line of work—those mean that I’m on to something. My subconscious insists on knitting things together, but you probably already know that.” He stumbles to a halt, catching the patient and exhausted expression on Derek’s face. “This is not the first time I’ve done this.”

“Not even the tenth,” Derek says. “There are a lot of things that wake us up in the middle of the night, and your subconscious conclusions are about half of them.”

There’s something he’s leaving out there, a hitch in his breath like he was about to continue, but Stiles doesn’t have time for that now. He licks his lips, tries to find the words. “Lydia said I drowned. Only, I don’t think I drowned, because frankly, I’m not that much of an idiot, and if the idea of it scares the crap out of me now, I can’t think I’d like it any better when I actually am myself.” He cuts a hand through the air. “So maybe it looked like I drowned.”

“Scott found you in water.”

Stiles stops, not sure what to do with that. “Okay, well. I’m pretty sure the drowning part was accidental, and maybe the water was… it was… take me there? Because something’s there. Something I left behind, and it’s important, and we need to go get it. Except… fuck. Kids. We have kids and we can’t just leave.”

“I’ll call Scott.” Derek rolls over, reaches for the phone lying on the nightstand. “He’ll come over.” The conversation is low—almost too low for Stiles to hear—and over quickly. “Get dressed,” Derek instructs as he drops the phone back on the table. “We can be ready to go by the time he gets here; it’s not a long walk.”

“Because we all live on the same land. With the tree, and the river, and the pond, and…” Stiles is letting his mouth spill out whatever words come through his mind, barely pausing for breath until he needs to inhale roughly. He yanks on jeans and a t-shirt, digs out a hoodie that seems comfortable but too big across his shoulders, the thumb holes worn when he slips them over his hands. He curls his fingers, frowns slightly and glances at Derek who has a very bemused smile. “Sorry,” Stiles says, and Derek shrugs one shoulder.

“Makes you smell more like me,” is all he says.

“And you like that. Possessive wolf that you are,” Stiles muses, running his fingers over the soft material of Derek’s hoodie. It makes no sense, not consciously, not in the real world, but he _knows_ that dream was real. He knows that he runs with wolves. _Wolves_. Another rough inhale and he lets it out with a sharp _whoosh_ before he feels fully stable again. “I’m okay,” he says. “I’m okay.”

Maybe he’s trying to convince himself.

Maybe it’ll work.

They’ve got bigger things to deal with right now.

Derek moves, and just like that, Stiles knows he’s heard something downstairs. Something so quiet that a normal set of ears can’t hear it, but when Stiles sinks into the _feel_ of the house, he knows what it is: Scott’s here. He trails after Derek, following him down the stairs and into the living room, where Scott stands clad in only a pair of sleep pants. He scrubs a hand through his hair, rubs at his eyes.

“Is this the sort of emergency where I need to stay awake or can I sleep on the couch?”

“Asleep should be fine,” Stiles says, at the same time as Derek gruffly mutters _sleep_. Stiles snorts, and Derek glares at him. He spreads his hands. “You said you’re used to this from me,” he protests as Scott snickers, and Derek glowers.

“That doesn’t mean I have to like it. Where are we going?”

Stiles hesitates halfway through the door. “Um. That’s a really good question, because I don’t explicitly _know_ but I know that if I start running, I’m going to get there. And that we should just… run. Like we run.” He gestures between the two of them. “In that you happen to be furry running sort of way.”

The look Derek gives him is considering, like there’s something more he should ask, or say, but once again the words remain unsaid. Instead he walks out onto the lawn and unashamedly sheds his clothing, dropping the jeans and boxers first, then stripping off the shirt. Stiles barely has a chance to take him in, but he _tries_ to memorize it. The lean body, the defined muscles, the slight hint of roundness in his gut that somehow makes him seem more human and less supermodel. Then the air shimmers and twists, and Derek drops to his knees with a raw howl as his eyes flash red and his body turns wolf.

Stiles just stares. “Dude, please tell me that I have _not_ gotten jaded about that since the first time I saw it.” When the wolf glares, he holds his hands up. “Okay, okay, hell, even if I didn’t know that was you, the eyes would give it away. Even your wolf has a strong eyebrow game.”

Derek just _waits_ , and Stiles waits as well, wanting inspiration to strike. He’s outside. He knows he needs to go somewhere, get something, get to the bottom of the mystery of what happened to his mind. And it’s all inside his head, just waiting to be unlocked.

Maybe the only thing he needs to do is run.

He puts up the hood, shrugging into it, letting his vision go dark around the edges. Cut off from full sight, he lets himself feel, takes in the energy he senses and breathes it out in a rush of air. There’s a strange feeling behind his eyes, then the world twists and he sees the way the energy moves around him. He takes a step forward, then another, then he lets himself run.

He gives over to instinct, feet carrying him on a sure path through the trees that overtake the world as soon as he gets beyond the small copse of houses that make up the pack’s living area. Derek lopes along beside him, keeping up easily, a constant, comfortable companion. Stiles isn’t sure where he’s going, but he doesn’t care as long as he gets there.

Which is when he trips over something that he’s sure shouldn’t be there, some blip in the energy—wards that he set, he thinks, something that he put into place and shouldn’t be shaped like _this_. He stumbles forward, hands windmilling, Derek close to his feet, and he twists in mid-air, falling backwards with a splash.

Water closes over his head and it’s disturbingly familiar. One hand flails out, reaches, catches onto Derek’s fur and he is hauled back onto the bank.

“This is where I was found,” he says, as soon as he can talk again. Derek nods his head, eyes lit a somber red. Stiles sucks in breath, makes sure his lungs are still working after the scare. His clothes are sodden, so he strips them off, not caring that he’s naked in the middle of the woods. The ground feels right under his feet, like he’s connecting to his own energy signature that was left behind.

“I was naked, wasn’t I?” he asks, unsurprised by the confirming nod. He goes to his knees, digs his hands into the dirt and feels for the disruption. He _made_ this and he _made_ this break. It’s his fault somehow, and he has to remember what he did to break things, and _why_. He closes his eyes, pulls at the air and twists his fingers into it—whatever _it_ is.

Memories rush over him so swiftly that it steals his breath; he gasps, shuddering, reaching out with one free hand, begging for Derek to come close. He drags the wolf in, wraps an arm around him, and tries to _share_ what he sees.

Another wolf stands before them, cast solely in hallucination, but from the whine he knows Derek sees her too. She meets their gazes, eyes quiet and serious before they flash from hazel to red, and Derek’s flash in return. Stiles feels a burn behind his own eyes, and is still unsure what that means.

The wolf in his arms shifts rapidly and Stiles is left with an armful of naked Derek, hair coarse against his skin as he surges forward, reaching out. “Mom.”

There are more wolves coming forward: a tiny russet one, a larger grey one, a viciously huge tan beast that walks beside Talia as if her equal. Two cubs roll and play off to the side, nipping at each other and yipping quietly, ignoring the adults.

Talia shifts and kneels there, one hand on the ground, the other reaching for Derek, ghostly fingers sifting through his hair. “My son,” she whispers, and the sound floats on the air. “You have done so well for yourself. For us, and for our family and pack. Your choices and your actions do you proud.”

Her attention turns to Stiles, and she stands to reach for him, both hands curling around his neck, claws biting sharply cold into the base of his spine. “Remember,” she whispers, as her claws dig deep.

And he does.

#

They lie there, curled together on the cold dirt. Stiles aches as if he’s run ten miles, even though he knows it isn’t that far to this particular glade. He’s always loved this place, and it’s where Lydia said she could feel the spirits of the Hale family the clearest, not back where the house had burned.

“They haven’t left, you know,” she had said, and that’s when the idea took root. “They’re still here, still close. They’re still a part of the land.”

And Stiles knew that he could make them a part of their family as well.

Maybe he should have asked for a bit of help; it would have saved him some trouble.

“How did you do it?” Derek asks softly.

“Long complicated process involving your mother’s claws—sorry, I stole them, but my heart was in the right place—and apparently some things I don’t exactly remember, but I do at least know what I meant to do. I think I might have ended up in the water by accident, when I put too much into the wards and blew myself backwards,” Stiles admits ruefully. “Tiny miscalculation.”

“Nearly killed yourself,” Derek says dryly. “Why does this not surprise me. What part of _always take backup_ do you not remember?”

“That’s for my job. Malia would’ve been useless here. She’s a fantastic partner on the force, but terrible around magic,” Stiles says easily. He’s deflecting and he knows Derek will let him get away with it for now. Thankfully.

Because he’s sure he’ll hear about it later, when Derek comes down from the idea that he’s seen his family.

“You can do this any time,” he says quietly. “And so can the kids.” He lets his hand drift down Derek’s chest until it’s resting on the small swell that he thought was softness earlier; he knows _exactly_ what it is now. “They are Hales, and they can have their family around them. The whole pack can. I’ve made it so anyone in the pack can do it. Without risk of being blown into the water. All they have to do is come here and ground themselves, and they will see your family.”

There is only silence, and Stiles twists worriedly; this isn’t the reaction he was expecting. “Derek?”

Water shines at the corners of Derek’s eyes, which are tightly closed, his lips pressed thin. Stiles kisses him carefully, whispers his name again until Derek drags in a ragged breath. He twines his fingers behind Stiles’s head, holds him while he kisses him back.

“Thank you,” Derek says, and that’s all the words they have for a long time.

#

It’s morning by the time they wake up and walk back to the house. Stiles’s clothes are dry, smelling vaguely of damp and earth. Derek pads by his side in wolf form. Stiles hears voices outside, slows his feet so he can see Scott and the kids before they see him.

“I have to get to work soon,” Scott says. “And at least one of you has to get to school.” He touches Angie on the head, and Stiles takes in the way the others are sitting quietly. Every single child who is old enough to pay attention on his or her own—every child that has reached toddlerhood—is watching, rapt, and Stiles knows why.

Scott’s a good teacher. He’s _brilliant_ , really, absolutely perfect for their pack. The rest of the adults are nearby: Isaac on the porch with baby Ryan in his arms, and Malia in uniform and trying to juggle twins while Kira urges Tamara back into the pack of children to learn. Allison and Lydia are sprawled together, their son curled against Lydia’s hip, and their daughter watching Scott avidly.

It’s Nathan who has center stage, his nose screwed up in concentration. He holds his hands out, fingers splayed, and when Angie leans in to bare her teeth and growl at him, eyes flashing, he snarls right back, leaping towards her, claws flashing out. Scott is right there, refereeing the fight between the older and younger sibling, hiding a smile when Angie lets out a howl of pure indignation at Nathan’s nip.

Jacob claps, and Tamara turns back, arms crossed as she looks at her mothers.

“I have a book,” she announces, her soft lisp making her sound her age when her words sound older. “Can I go to school now?”

“I’d rather play with Scott all day,” Angie admits. “Being a wolf is better than any book. I can’t growl on the playground, and Daddy says I’m not allowed to win races just because I’m super fast.”

“Your Daddy is right,” Scott tells her, ruffling her wild hair. “But that’s why we learn, so we can have human friends as well as wolves. We’re all in this together.”

“Did you just quote _High School Musical_?” Allison calls out, and Lydia buries her face in Allison’s shoulder, her body shaking with laughter.

Derek noses at Stiles’s hand, and they walk out together, bowled over by children who greet Stiles happily.

“ _Please_ tell me that this means you’ll be coming back to work,” Malia yells over the clamber, and Stiles has to laugh.

“If I’m cleared for it, yes,” he says. He glances at Allison and Kira. “Did the negotiations go well? Sorry, I know I was supposed to go on that trip.” He spots Derek going into their house out of the corner of his eye, but he keeps their kids with him, sitting down on the ground so they can swarm over him. Jacob gnaws on his hand with tiny cub teeth, and Stiles whines at him until he laughs.

Kira makes a face. “Um. Well. They’d still like to meet you. I might have tripped over something important. But no one got shot, and nothing’s broken, so we still have a chance to set up the alliance.”

Malia pulls Kira in, kissing her soundly. “I love you,” she says, and the fond note conveys so much more.

Stiles waits until Derek comes back, until he’s standing there, watching all of them like the alpha that he is. He waits until Scott looks up, the two alphas exchanging glances, Scott nodding at whatever he sees in Derek’s expression. He stands slowly, Jacob held on one side, Nathan on the other. “So,” he says, and they all look at him.

He smiles ruefully. “I screwed up. And I didn’t. And we’ll go over the full story tonight when we have a cookout by the water, and I promise, it will be awesome in ways that the last few days _haven’t_ been at all awesome. But right now, I just want to say thank you, to all of you, for being an incredible pack and I can’t believe I forgot you. Even for a little while.”

He forgets, sometimes, what it’s like to be part of a pack, but they will always help him remember. He is swarmed, nuzzled, marked with scent and touch. He is passed from pack member to pack member, between humans and weres. He hugs every child, and in the end, he kisses Derek long and slow, like he never wants to let him go.

In the end, though, he remembers it all vividly, because this is his place. His family. His pack.

This isn’t a dream, and if Stiles has anything to say about it, he will never forget it again.

 


End file.
